Shiera followed behind her, curious to see what this was all about. The crowd seemed really upset. There were even a few familiar faces in the crowd. Twilight finally spoke up, "Okay, everypony, calm down!"

"Calm down?" cried Rarity, "I just had a Pinkie HURRICANE raging through my shop!"

"And they trashed our critter picnic!" Fluttershy said, her face clearly showing her anger.

Shiera had to admit, she didn't think the shy one was one to get angry. Though she could sympathize with them. She wasn't exactly a fan of the Pink One either....Still, it did seem rather bizarre. "Is the Pink One always causing trouble?" Shiera asked Twilight.

"What? No! Pinkie Pie may be outgoing and excitable sometimes, but she never do something like this, especially not to her friends," Twilight explained.

Shiera turned towards the angry crowd. "Still, that is a lot of trouble for just one pink pony to get themselves into," she replied dryly.

"That's the problem!" exclaimed one of the ponies in the crowd, "This town already has it's hands full with one Pinkie Pie, now their's dozens of them, and they are ruining everything!"

"Oh..." Shiera replied, not entirely sure how to respond to that.

"Dozens? Please, everypony, hang on while i try to figure something out!" Twilight pleaded, then she quickly darted back into the library along with Spike.

They were gone for about a minute before they came back outside. "Does anypony here know how we can tell the real Pinkie Pie from the rest of them?" Twilight suddenly asked.

The Crowd murmured for a bit, but they didn't seem to have a good answer for.

Shiera then noticed a Pinkie Pie bouncing in the background before moving her way to the front, "Oh, Twilight!! I have to talk to you! I need your help" the Pink One pleaded.

As Twilight began to make her reply, another Pinkie appeared, mimicking Twilight's motions and mouth movements, copying her every move. Shiera decided that needed to stop so she reared up onto her hind legs and tried to shoo the pink one who was mimicking Twilight away. Unfortunately for her, another pink one appeared and tripped her in mid motion, and she fell forward onto the other pink one.

"Excuse me, whoever you are, but I'm not talking to any of you Pinkies unless you are the real Pinky," Twilight replied.

"But I am the real Pinkie!" she exclaimed.

"No, I'm the real Pinkie!" exclaimed the one Shiera had fallen onto.

"No, I'm the real Pinkie!" cried another. and then another, and then another. And before they knew there were several dozen pink ones claiming to be the real pink one. Enough to even out number the crowd that had gathered.

Shiera groaned as she lifted herself off of the Pink One she had tripped onto. It was then that she noticed where one of her hooves were, and quickly yanked it back. "Oh sorry, i didn't mean to touch your..." Shiera began but stopped dead as she noticed the Pink One was perfectly fine, even though she touched her Cutie Mark.

"Oh, no problem!" the pink one said, bouncing away. Shiera then turned to Twilight, who was now conversing with AppleJack. "Huh. Good news, i think it's safe for me to..." Shiera poked AppleJack's Cutie Mark.
An unearthly screech could be heard emanating from the contact, and AppleJack darted away with a yelp of pain.

"What was that fer?" AppleJack cried, rubbing her hindquarters. Her Cutie Mark flickered for a bit, and that same scorched hoof mark could be seen before it faded away and her Cutie Mark returned to normal.

"Yeah, why did you do that, Shiera?" Twilight asked.

"What was that?" asked AppleJack.

Shiera lowered her head in apology, "S-Sorry. I had thought for a moment that i had been cured of that. I had touched the Pink One's Cutie Mark, and nothing had happened. So i just thought...."

"Wait, you touched one of the Pinkie's Cutie Mark, and nothing happened?" Twilight pondered.

"Yes," Shiera replied.

"I wonder what that means?"

"We can't worry about that now, we still have to deal with all these Pinkies!" AppleJack exclaimed.

"Don't worry, i have a spell that can send them all back to where they came from! But there's a catch, if we don't find out who is the real Pinkie Pie, we might accidentally send her back as well!" Twilight explained.

Shiera pondered this for a moment before an idea occurred to her. "I have an idea. But there is no guarantee that it will work...it's more of just a gut feeling, really..."

"What is it?" Spike asked.

"Well, maybe i can go around and touch each of these Pink One's Cutie Marks. If my hunch is correct, the fake ones won't feel anything, but the real one just might. Of course, this is only speculation. It could also be true that the Pink One is simply immune to my touch, but it wouldn't hurt to try."

"That might just work. But there is certainly no guarantee..." Twilight said, rubbing her chin with a hoof.

"It won't hurt to try. I may not be certain as to what it is that is going on, both with all the Pinkie Pies, and with your burning hoof touch, but what i do know is that this plan won't work unless we can get all the Pinkie Pies in one place."

"Maybe that one's the real Pinkie!" Spike exclaimed, pointing to one that was moping on a table.

"Please, the Real Pinkie has never sat that long in one place her entire life!" Twilight retorted.

"Maybe i'll ask...." Spike offered.

"Don't bother! Of course she's going to say she's the real Pinkie! They all do!" Twilight replied in frustration.

"I would have to agree with her on that one," Shiera sighed, "I don't think asking around will help much if they all believe themselves to be the real Pink One."

"I think we should try Shiera's plan. I can go get the rest of my family to go and help round up all of these Pinkies. Even if her plan doesn't work, it'll be good to have them all in one place," AppleJack explained.

"I agree. You go do that, meanwhile Spike and I will find a good place to hold them, and Shiera.....we'll let you know when we find a good place, and when all the Pinkies are rounded up."

Shiera shrugged, "Sounds like a plan to me,"

She watched as they all went off to do their various tasks. Shiera frowned. if her plan didn't work, they would need another way to discern the real one. Unfortunately, Shiera couldn't think of anything, as she did not know the Pink One that well...

It was surprisingly not that long until Twilight returned and guided Shiera to where they would hold all of the Pink Ones. It was a theatre of sorts, very spacious. However, Shiera didn't get a chance to look around long before Twilight spoke up. "Here they come!" she warned. Shiera peaked out of the door to see a whole hoard of Pink Ones being rounded up by the Apple family, guiding them straight towards them. It reminded her of a ranch she visited during the war.

Shiera stepped out of the way as the entire hoard of Pink Ones barrelled into the building, and the doors were shut behind them. The Pink Ones all bounced excitedly around as Twilight tried to calm them down. Finally Twilight snapped, "SIT DOWN!"

The whole room went quiet as all the Pink Ones turned to look at her, and then quickly took their seats, in quite the uniform fashion.

"Better, now i suppose you are all wondering why i brought you here today..." Twilight began.

"For Fun?" one of the Pink Ones asked.

"No, not exactly...."

"Wait up!" cried a voice as the doors burst open to reveal Rainbow Dash carrying another Pink One. "I've got one more! I found this one poking the ground with her hoof, drawing frowny faces..."

"Have her come sit with the others.

Rainbow Dash blinked for a moment and then just tossed her down.

Twilight then turned to Shiera, and Shiera nodded. She had given many speeches to her men in the past, so this was no different for her. "Now. We are going to give you a test. Don't worry, this shouldn't hurt. All that's going to happen is i am going to touch your Cutie Marks. You don't even have to do anything. It'll be fun i promise."

"Won't that hurt?" asked one of the Pink Ones, but Shiera wasn't able to catch where exactly it came from. "Oh, don't be silly, touching Cutie Marks never hurt anypony!" exclaimed another.

Shiera then stepped down from the stage, and began to go row by row, touching each of their cutie marks. For the first three rows, nothing happened. Most just giggled or said something goofy. Shiera was beginning to get a little concerned, but thankfully, in the middle of the fourth row, when she touched the cutie mark, an unearthly screech could be heard, and the Pink One jumped into the air, yelping in pain. Her Cutie Mark flickered for a bit, and a bright red hoof mark could be seen for a minute before it faded away.

"Great! It worked!" Twilight exclaimed, and without another word she zapped the rest with several blast from her horn, and they each began to inflate before folding into themselves and turned into a stream of light that flew off into the distance, presumably returning to wherever it was they came from. It was a slightly horrifying sight, and did put credibility to the fact that Twilight was a powerful mage. Shiera watched as Twilight's horn glowed a bit from the heat of use, but she blew out the heat and a little bit of steam drifted off of her horn.

"Owww!! That really hurts!" Pinkie Pie complained. The other girls hugged her, glad to have found the real one.

Shiera smirked, "What do you know? A gentle touch really does go a long way." With that, both Shiera and Twilight began laughing. The others didn't quite get it, but they too, soon joined in with the laughter.

This place was weird, that was certain. But Shiera was starting to suspect she might enjoy it here. Things were definitely becoming more interesting....

Author's Note

And there we go! Now we can finally see where exactly this all falls in place on the timeline. Now things, of course will be happening differently than the show's canon. but there will be similarities from time to time, at least for a little while.

And before you ask, yes, Shiera knows Pinkie Pie's name isn't The Pink One. However, due to Shiera not having the best encounters with her so far, it is the name that she has decided to refer to her as. for now.